- The top three research areas this month included factors influencing health conditions and healthcare service (six articles), infection and parasites (four articles), and urinal and reproduction system diseases (three articles), which were publicized by the Journal of Clinical Medicine&The American Journal of Managed Care & Frontiers in Neurology.
- Selected Paper in February：Medication treatment for migraine in Taiwan does not follow the recommended guideline.
People who suffer from migraines have their quality of life and work efficiency greatly affected. The Taiwan Headache Medical Association has published treatment guideline with clear recommendations on what medications to use for episodic and chronic migraines. However, it is unknown whether the actual clinical prescription for migraine patients in Taiwan following the guideline. The research team from Taipei Rongzong University and National Yang-Ming Chiao Tung University used health insurance claims data from 2013 to 2017 to explore this issue.
The results showed that about three quarters of the patients received acute medication, and only about one fifth of the patients received preventive medication, the proportion significantly below the guideline. Optimizing the use of preventive medication can reduce the number of acute attacks and improve the efficacy of acute relief medications. The author emphasized that Taiwan's health insurance payment system does not have any restrictions on preventive medication, so it may be attributed to healthcare professionals' insufficient knowledge about migraine medication management.
The study had some limitations. The International Classification of Diseases codes were used to identify patients with migraine, which may cause some inaccuracies or misclassifications. Particularly, distinguishing episodic and chronic migraine may have errors. Patients may also buy medications at pharmacies and were not included in this study. The period for this study only observe until 2017. The usage of some new migraine drugs launched in 2020 and 2021 haven't been seen yet.
Highlight of SEP (2023) ：The major study this month focused on the risk of bladder and ureter reflux and chronic kidney diseases, the risk of C-type hepatitis relating to extrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma, and the therapy model and medical resources used in migraine patients in Taiwan.
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